


And Spring is Coming Soon

by Age or Wizardry (ageorwizardry)



Category: Winter's Bone (2010)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-20
Updated: 2010-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-13 20:39:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/141514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ageorwizardry/pseuds/Age%20or%20Wizardry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ree starts learning the shape of her life now, and discovers how Gail can fit into it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And Spring is Coming Soon

**Author's Note:**

  * For [presentpathos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/presentpathos/gifts).



> Thanks to my betas.
> 
> I'm using some of the backstory from the book as well, because it was so wonderfully femslashy! I've tried to incorporate it in a way that will make sense if you haven't read the book, but won't over-explain things if you have.

First things first. Ree counted the money.

She had long, hard practice at counting money, counting it down to every penny and trying to figure out how long it would last. She was fluent at translating money into things—she could figure any amount she'd ever handled into cans of baked beans within seconds—but she struggled to grasp what this might translate into. It went without saying that it was more money than she had ever seen before. More than any car she'd ever seen, probably; more than her horse Ginger several times over; maybe even more than her entire house and all their land and all the trees growing over it.

The money almost scared her, suddenly. She pushed the bills away a little with her fingertips, gingerly, warily. She had never had so much money: she had never had so much to lose. She hardened with rage at the thought. Hadn't she lost her father? And hadn't she faced down the chance of losing everything else as well—her house, her family’s future? But now they were safe, and all this money just a way to keep them safer. Best not to keep all those bills just lying around for long, though. Money found mischief to do if not put to useful work.

Ideas whirled wildly around in her head—food; new winter clothes for Sonny and Ashlee, a little big, because they were still growing; hay for fodder; ammunition; new shoes; dentist visits; Christmas presents—until she almost felt she had spent it all already and come back down to zero. She got hold of herself by taking out an old school notebook and pencil, writing down all her ideas and setting them in order. She would need to plan carefully.

The first thing, she decided, would be wheels. No more asking friends and relations and friends' relations for rides, begging what she needed from people who had no need to give it to her and often didn't. Her pencil stilled and her cheeks burned as she recalled the humiliations, the otherwise simple errands made impossible for lack of a vehicle. She breathed out slowly, her eyes closed. Everything would be easier with wheels.

She plotted out purchases after that, guessing where she didn't know the cost. She did the math, checked it; counted more than once to make sure she had it right.

She’d want to get some kind of job in town before the money ran out. With wheels, she finally could.

No matter how high the number, money would always count down to zero.

 

In the morning, after she'd gotten the kids off to school, Ree walked into town for the last time and bought wheels. A working truck such as half the valley owned—beat-up but ran well, not too old. It felt good to be able to plunk down a stack of cash and own it straight, a kind of good Ree wasn't used to feeling. She returned with the backseat of the cab filled with groceries and the truck bed loaded with hay. After she put away the groceries, she walked over to Sonya's, Ginger's lead in hand.

 _Never ask for what ought to be offered_ , she'd told Sonny, and it was her hope he'd be able to live by it. She couldn't do it; there was always too much needed and never enough offered. She'd had to ask Sonya to take care of Ginger, and it had hurt Ree deep inside her, almost as much as it hurt to be unable to feed the horse herself. It was not as bad as when she was unable to feed the hunger out of Sonny and Ashley—she was willing to let someone else take care of her horse, while she would never give up care of her brother and sister. But it was worse in a way, because she couldn't explain to Ginger any part of why things had gone the way they had, why she had no more food to offer.

"I come to take Ginger back, now I can feed her," she said to Sonya. "Thanks for keeping her for me. I can offer you some hay in return for what she ate."

Sonya squinted against the sunlight, calculating. "Well," she offered eventually, “Let’s say two or three bales would put us even. It’s all part of being neighborly. Just like borrowing a cup of sugar.”

Ree had never borrowed a cup of sugar in her life. “I’ll bring ‘em round later on. See you.”

As she walked Ginger back onto her own land, she turned her face up to the sun over the bare trees, and her heart felt so light. She took down the first of the hay and gave Ginger the first handful herself. It felt good to see her taking the food she needed from her hand, even better than paying cash for the truck had felt. Ree leaned into Ginger, pressed her face close against the horse's head and neck, felt the warmth of her hide, breathed in her smell. She listened to the big blunt teeth grinding up the grass. She breathed in deep and stood there for an endless while, fingers caressing Ginger's neck and tangling gently with her mane.

Finally she kissed the horse's neck and slapped her side to say goodbye for now and went to unload the rest of the hay. When she was done, she stopped by the truck and stretched, feeling the work she’d done. She had a sudden urge to go driving over all the country roads, going nowhere in particular, only cruising for the rest of the day just because if she felt like it, she could. A waste of gas, of course, so she probably wouldn't, but all the same she imagined it as she reached her arms above her head, let the roads unfold in her mind until she realized she was thinking of the way to Gail's place.

Ree let her arms fall.

Gail had been her best friend forever, the first person she thought of to share her trials or triumphs with, but it almost made Ree more sad than happy to see or think of Gail now. Ree had seen Gail few times since her marriage and fewer since she gave birth, and each time Gail had seemed newly hemmed in and trapped by her husband and son, neither of which she'd wanted. She loved her son fiercely, but was irrevocably tied by him to Floyd—and it wasn't that Floyd hit Gail or anything, but still he wasn't good for her. Hope hurt, and so Ree had never _hoped_ that Gail would love her. She had stopped herself from ever thinking it in the first place, years ago, and had almost forgotten that it was there not to be thought, hidden in secret corners of her mind and heart. Gail deserved to be with someone who loved her, whoever it was. Ree thought Gail would need love to thrive on, especially with her spending so much love on Ned, and she didn't get any from Floyd. The light Ree loved was draining out of Gail little by little, and it killed Ree to see it happen.

She wanted so much for someone she loved not to be ground down to dust by the machinery of the world. It was the great hope of her life that Sonny and Ashlee might yet escape it, might be able to build lives that wouldn't crush their souls. But Gail had always seemed uncrushable to Ree, and Ree had always been certain she would escape intact into the rest of her life. Ree could see Gail as an old woman in her mind, striding bold and upright across the mountains, unbound and unbroken by anything. It had never occurred to her to hope for Gail not to be crushed until it had already started to happen, and the cruel surprise made her want to look away.

And so a thousand times she had thought of going to see Gail, these past long months, and each time she'd chosen not to, until that day so recently her world had shattered around her and she could think of no place else to go first except to Gail. And, yes, it had still been sad to see her there—but then Gail had come to Ree, bringing the truck and her baby and her own sparkling self, and stayed several days. Gail’s light might be diminished by her new circumstances, but it shone mighty bright for Ree through those dark days.

Gail was the first person she'd gone to with her bad news; why shouldn't she go to her with her good news, too?

She thought of what Uncle Teardrop had told her about her father: that he wasn't a snitch, and he wasn't, and he wasn't, and then one day he was. You had to choose over and over again what kind of person you would be, and if you started choosing differently you might change who you were. Over and over she had chosen not to see Gail, and it chilled her to wonder how many more times she might have left to make that choice before she became a Ree that wouldn't even think of going to Gail. That decided her, and she felt the cold, distant relief of walking back from a cliff edge. Better to have Gail in her life, even sad, even permanently tied to Floyd, than not have Gail in her life at all.

And maybe seeing her would get easier if she just did it more often.

 

She arrived at Gail and Floyd's place to see Gail slam shut the door and storm down the front steps holding Ned in one arm and a tote bag on the other. Saw her stop a few steps into the yard, suddenly still and uncertain. Gail looked up at the sound of the truck, and relief bloomed over her face when she saw Ree. As Ree pulled to a stop, Gail flung open the door and thrust the bag inside, saying, "Here, take this—I'll just go back inside and get the car seat, and then we can—" Slam. Gail whirled around, marched back up the steps with renewed vigor. Ree could hear loud voices from inside the house—mostly Gail's—but not what they said. It was only a few moments before Gail came back out carrying a car seat with Ned securely strapped inside. Ree helped her get it situated in the truck, and they hugged awkwardly with Ned between them.

"Shit, sweet pea," Gail said once they were moving. "I’m sorry about all that. You’ve got great timing, though! I’ve got to stay somewhere else for a while, and I know you didn't sign up to have me stay over at your place again. I can go stay with my folks, really. If you'll drop me off, I can—hey." She looked around as if noticing for the first time that she was in a truck. "Whose truck is this, sweet pea? I don't recognize it."

“I got it from Mark Foley this morning; you know, his uncle teaches shop at our high school.”

“We don’t really know those folks, though, Ree.”

“Yeah, I only really met them to speak to this morning.”

“Why would they let you borrow their truck?”

“They wouldn’t.” And Ree couldn't help grinning.

Gail gasped. "No! Is it _yours_?"

And Ree nodded up and down, real big. "Yep. I got us a getaway car."

Gail said, "But _how_? Forget about my troubles! Your news is way more fun—tell me all about it!" Ree told her everything that had happened since Gail had gone back home: first the horrifying—the ordeal by which she had won her dead dad’s hands and saved the rest of her family—and then the unlooked-for windfall from the bail bondsman. Gail listened raptly, only interrupting when she realized Ree had passed the turn to her parents’ house.

"To tell the truth, I’d be real glad if you’d come stay with me,” Ree answered her. “Like I'd pass up a chance to have you all to myself for a while!"

Gail laughed and replied, "Well, all to yourself and Ned, anyway," looking down at him in the car seat. Something about her voice, her expression, made Ree unsure how to respond. She wasn't sure whether to joke or be serious, so she deliberately changed the subject.

"Wait with me to pick up Sonny and Ashlee at the school bus stop? I want to surprise them."

"They haven’t seen the truck yet?"

"Nope. Went and got it after they went to school. You're the first one I showed it to."

Gail smiled quick and bright; Ree basked in the light of it.

Ree leaned against the side of the truck waiting for Sonny and Ashlee to come off the school bus. They greeted the news that the truck was theirs with awe and begged to ride home in the truck bed. Ree went extra slow on the dirt road home, hearing their shrieks of delight through the window.

Gail helped Ree get dinner together for everyone. After dinner and homework Sonny and Ashlee nested down in blankets on the sofa and recliner, within sight of the wood stove that was the house’s only source of heat, and Ree tucked them in.

“Night, Mom,” she said on her way out of the room, and her mother nodded to her from her usual chair near the stove.

In Ree’s bedroom it was colder. Ree had dragged the old crib out and set it up by the wall, and Gail settled Ned inside. As she rummaged through her bag for an extra blanket, she chuckled and said, "You know, I brought this huge bag chock-full of all Ned's stuff, but I didn't bring anything for me? All I've got to wear is the clothes I'm standing up in!"

"Well, you know where all my clothes are. Wear anything you want; it should all about fit you."

Gail flashed a grin. "I was counting on it, sweet pea! It’ll be like sharing clothes when we were in school together."

They stripped down together and donned nightgowns. Ree was keenly aware of Gail's briefly bared skin, revealed without modesty or shame. She looked, then didn’t look—tried to focus on covering her own coldness as quickly as possible. They snuggled together under piles of quilts in the positions of a hundred of their sleepovers, Ree’s front to Gail’s back, the waterbed beneath them undulating with their shivers.

Their shivering stilled as they warmed the space between the sheets together; the waterbed rocked more and more gently.

Gail's voice came subdued over the small space to Ree's ear. "I think it's really over between me and Floyd, sweet pea."

"You sure it's not just another fight? Y'all have yourselves a few of those."

Gail shook her head, resigned. "The cause ain't going to change. He loves that Heather Powell, he _always_ loved Heather, and he's always _goin’_ to love Heather. I know he's still fucking her, and—" quiet snort of laughter "—if I’m anything to go by, one day he'll probably have a kid with her. It ain't ever going to get any better than this, and I can't take this."

Ree took this in. Hope stirred in the dark and secret corners of her heart, nosing toward the light. "You goin' to get a divorce?"

Gail blew air, an exasperated sigh. “We’ve been talking about it. _I’ve_ been talking about it. You know the crazy thing is, he’s the one who doesn’t want to? He’s the one going out and fucking this other woman every chance he gets, but _he_ doesn’t want to get a divorce and do right by _both_ of us. Both me and Heather, I mean—I don't care anymore what's right by Floyd.”

"No shit. Why doesn't he want to? Seems like he would. I mean—" Ree stumbled over her words. "I always have thought he was real lucky to have you, but if he doesn't. If he really wants Heather, why wouldn't he want to let you go? If he doesn’t want you, why would he want to keep you?"

"You mean, why does he want to keep a wife at home who takes care of the baby and the house for him, and still go out to fuck the girl he really loves? Question answers itself, really."

"Hell."

"There's different reasons. Floyd's parents only gave him the house because he married me, and he doesn't want them to say he can't stay there if we split. And he goes on and on about how if we divorce he'll have to pay child support and he can't afford that—like it won't be harder for _me_ ," Gail burst out. "I've got a baby boy to take care of and I never even finished high school. At least he has a job."

Ree squeezed her arm around Gail’s middle, touched her forehead to the back of Gail’s head. "You know you can stay here however long you need to. You don't have to worry about having a place to stay, at least."

Gail joined her fingers to Ree’s. "I sure do appreciate that, sweet pea." She sighed. "But I can't expect to stay here forever. Probably I'll end up back with Mom and Dad. They don't want to take me in, but they will. Can you believe they think Floyd and me ought to work it out? There ain't nothing _to_ work out. There's nothing I can do except stop caring that my husband is fucking another girl, and I can't do that. I know there's lots of couples have gone through some pretty messed-up shit and stayed together—I know Mom and Dad have been through some bad times themselves. But I just can't see keeping on feeling so lonely with someone sleeping right next to me."

Ree felt lonely in bed next to Gail right now—but less lonely than when Gail wasn't here. She took Gail’s hand more securely, trying to tell her silently: _I do mean it, though. You could stay here forever if you wanted to_.

 

The next morning Ree and the kids woke early, but Ree let Gail sleep. The sky seemed clear of clouds that would rain or snow, so Ree started laundry. By the time Ree was taking the first load out of the washing machine, Gail emerged from Ree's bedroom, yawning and carrying Ned, wearing Ree's clothes.

"Want me to help you hang those out on the line?" Gail gestured with her chin toward the laundry basket.

"Sure thing, sweet pea. Hey, I'll put in a load of sheets and things next, since you're here—it's lots easier to keep ‘em from dragging on the ground with two people."

They went outside together, Ree carrying the laundry basket, Gail Ned's car seat, which she set on the picnic table. As they worked, lifting and stretching, fastening clothespins with cold and numbing fingers, Ree watched Gail move. Her hair fell over her face as she bent; as she reached her wristbones showed out the ends of her sleeves. It pleased Ree to see Gail wearing her clothes. She was swathed in a coat so bulky Ree couldn't see much of her form, but she knew that underneath it probably every piece of clothing Gail wore except her nursing bra was actually Ree's. It felt like a sort of claim, _this person's life is part of mine; what belongs to me belongs to her as well_. If the strength of a claim depended on how much of it you could see,  
Ree and Gail would surely belong to each other by now. They had been swapping clothes for years, and clothes covered so much more of the body than a wedding ring.

The basket emptied, Gail whooped and said, "Man, it's cold out here! Let's get back inside and have some coffee or hot chocolate or something."

Ree made three cups and set one by her mother in case she wanted one. Gail and Ree took their cups back into Ree’s bedroom and they leaned up against the headboard together, quilts rumpled over and around them. It was fun to go back to bed in the middle of the morning, even if they were sitting up and not sleeping. It reminded Ree of a time not so long ago, when spending a morning like this would have meant playing hooky from school, when Gail and Ree were still in school. A time before marriage and motherhood for Gail; a time when Ree’s father was still sometimes around. The feeling of delight in harmless mischief bubbled up in both of them, and their conversation was filled with laughter as the hours of the morning passed by.

"I mean, the sex wasn't so good the _first_ time that I would ever have gone back for it _again_. If I'd known it would get me hitched to him and doing it over and over again, I'd have just stayed home that night!" Gail had reached a full head of steam on an increasingly raucous and hilarious rant about the general failings of Floyd as a lover, husband, father, and all-around decent human being. "You wouldn't _believe_ how bad he is at kissing. Shit, sweet pea, you kissed me better than that when we were thirteen!"

She certainly should have, Ree thought, after all the practice she'd had. For Ree and Gail had each been the first the other had ever kissed, and they'd practiced on each other for the better part of a year. They had consciously assigned parts based on the soap operas and other programs they’d seen, one playing the man and the other playing the woman, then switching off. They knew even then the parts were wildly exaggerated, but they played them with great passion and had fun. None of it had anything much to do with real kissing, as both girls later found when they moved on to try it with boys. Ree wondered if Gail had ever thought of kissing Ree again, as Ree had. Neither one had ever suggested doing it again after they stopped, but if Gail ever had, Ree would certainly have accepted.

She unexpectedly found herself accepting now, with Gail offering to demonstrate how awful Floyd’s kissing was with herself playing Floyd and Ree playing the victim. Gail's lips touched hers, and Gail was still half-laughing, lips stretched over her teeth and unable to form a kiss properly, but Ree played along anyway—and suddenly she realized that she wasn't playing along, not really. She was not playing the part of Gail kissing Floyd played by Gail, nor the part of a woman from their practice years ago. For Ree this was real. She kissed Gail as she really wanted to kiss her, and soon Gail was also no longer kissing like Floyd or any man, but something different. Was this how Gail herself kissed? When Floyd kissed her, or in the time before Floyd some other boy, was this how Gail responded? Or was this something new, just between them?

There came a space in the kiss, like a pause in a conversation. Ree found herself with her face close to Gail's, eyes shut. One hand curved over Gail's hip. Her fingertips just barely curled into Gail's hair where the base of her head met her neck.

She opened her eyes. Gail's eyes were still shut. Ree had never seen that expression on her face before; she didn't know what it meant. As Ree watched, Gail's eyes fluttered open. She reached up and framed Ree's chin with her thumbs, fingertips splayed gently along either side of Ree's neck.

"Sweet pea," Gail breathed. She seemed to collect herself, laughed a little. "You still kiss better than Floyd. You kiss me better than any man or boy ever has."

Ree couldn't stand it of a sudden. She broke away, left the bed, headed toward—where?

Gail's voice stopped her in the doorway, softly saying, "Oh." Ree turned to see wonder in her eyes, light breaking across her face. "Floyd never loved me the way you do," she said slowly, tasting the words, discovering the truth in them as she said them. She looked directly at Ree and said, "You love me." She said it like an echo of herself, like a promise, but not at all like a question. She knew.

"Yes," said Ree. "I do."

Gail held open her arms and Ree came back to them. The two girls folded around each other and held each other tight.

"Will you stay with me?" Ree said, voice thick. Asking for what she needed again—but she was almost sure that Gail had already offered it.

"Can I? I mean, not to stay for a little while, but right on and on."

"I wish you would."

"Even though I can stay at my parents' house?"

“Yes, already, yes; do you want me to buy a ring or what?” It came thundering down on Ree that she _could_ buy Gail a ring, if Gail wanted her to. And Ree suddenly wanted to, very much. She had once looked on Gail with her husband and baby as one possible version of her own future, and one that she didn’t want. She could see now that what she hadn’t wanted were the paths that led away from each other, husbands and children being choices that might step-by-step take them away from each other forever. Now that they were coming together again, Ree felt she might be able to walk any path so long as Gail walked it with her.

Gail smiled and nestled closer against Ree. "I just didn't want to lay all my troubles on you, darlin'. You've got so many to carry already. And then me bringin’ a baby in here, and stuff..."

"I remember taking care of Sonny and Ashlee when they were babies; one more won’t hurt none.” She tweaked Gail’s nose, then smoothed her fingers down her cheek. “Don't you know? I lean on you for my troubles already. Hell, you cleaned my fuckin’ _wounds_ not too long ago. I just wish you'd lean back on me a bit sometimes."

"I just wanted you to be _sure_ , sweet pea.”

Ree murmured against Gail's hair, "I want to see what you look like when you’re an old woman walking through my trees." Her cheeks flamed with something like embarrassment, but happier, and her voice was soft and dark as rabbit’s fur. “Yeah, I’m sure." She meant it as much as she had ever meant anything in her life.

“Oh, sweet pea,” Gail said. She turned her face up to Ree, radiant. “You want to practice kissing some more?”

"Yeah," Ree said. "I want to practice till it's real."

 

That afternoon Ree showed Gail the list, and they planned to cross off the next item—warm winter clothes bought from a store, some of the first Sonny or Ashlee would own that weren't hand-me-downs. "And it'll be easier to sneak and get them Christmas presents if I have you to distract them for a minute," Ree told Gail. They took Ned in the truck to meet Ashlee and Sonny at the school bus again to take them into town. As they were getting out of the truck, Ree heard a voice say “Ree Dolly,” and turned and saw Mike Satterfield from A-1 Bonds. “Could I have a word with you? Won’t take a minute.” Ree looked at Gail and nodded, and Gail nodded back. Ree walked off a few steps with Satterfield.

“New truck?” he asked her.

Ree eyed him warily. “Yessir.”

"Making good use of that money, I see."

"Yessir."

"You know, Ree Dolly, I’ve been thinking about what you did, and it was mighty impressive. I’ve got a business proposition for you. How would you like to work for me doing bail bonds? I think you would have a real knack for the job.”

"Gettin' people out of jail, then haulin' 'em back in for the police? No, thank you."

"Well, now, I can see how you would object to doing the police's work for them, but that’s not what I do. The police put people in jail; I get them out."

"You just want me to work for you because I know all the Dollys in these parts, and you want me to help you when you track them down."

He chuckled ruefully. "You have got me there; that would be useful to me. I tell you what: you just think about it. If you decide to take me up on my offer, just walk through my door. It'll be open for you."

Ree thought about it as he walked away. Running people down to make sure they showed for court—that was what she'd set out to do about her dad, after all, before she began to realize he was dead. For all Uncle Teardrop had said that was a man's own decision to make, she had had to do it to protect the rest of her family. It wasn't the same as snitching, which she still abhorred—she wouldn't be telling the police anything. She’d just be showing them their man, and they’d still have to do all the work of proving charges against them. And by doing so, she might be able to keep families like hers from losing their homes and property.

She wasn't sure whether she would take the job, but she thought the offer was a good sign. If Mike Satterfield wanted her to work for him, maybe someone else would, too. Seemed a lot of money went through Mike Satterfield's hands—might be good money in it for her, if she went to work for him. She would think about it, talk it over with Gail tonight, and if they both thought it would be a good idea, she’d let him know.

As Ree and Gail steered the kids down the sidewalk to the store, a sparkle caught Ree’s eye and she looked left into the window of a jewelry store. It was a nicer store than she’d ever been inside, and her breath caught as she remembered the idea of the ring. Not yet, but one day, when Gail had taken off her old wedding ring, if she was ready to put on a new one, Ree would have one waiting for her.


End file.
